


The Moon Bird

by JoAsakura



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-04
Updated: 2013-02-04
Packaged: 2017-11-28 05:28:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/670801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoAsakura/pseuds/JoAsakura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>So, I've been playing ME1, now that it's out for the PS3, and the scene on Eletania kind of... struck me.</p><p>(slowly coming out of my post Mass Effect Big Bang hibernation period) :D</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Moon Bird

The Moon Bird

 

Shepard was never certain why he'd taken to carrying Sha'ira's trinket with him. She'd claimed it to be prothean – a small tablet of glassy black, faint lines etched into it's surface. It was small enough to be unobtrusive, and oddly comforting to hold.

It didn't help the bloody prothean visions jangling in his brain make any more sense, but it seemed to soothe the crushing anxiety that came along with thim.

It was also a smaller version of the great black ruins they found themselves staring at in the mossy Eletanian ravine. "Wow." Alenko breathed, voice raspier than usual through his breather helmet. "It looks untouched." (That, Shepard thought, was even more soothing. Although it was becoming awkward, trying to find excuses to make small talk with the Lieutenant just to hear him speak.)

"What the hell is that thing in the middle?" Vakarian slid down the slope.  He kept itching absently at his helmet.

"Get some images for Doctor T'Soni." Shepard ventured as he neared it. "I'm sure our resident prothean expert would like an eyeful of this." The silvery globe hung a few feet above the surface of the ruins, reflecting their approach like a still pond. Shepard paused, kneeling down as his HUD patiently ticked down a timer on how long they had before the local microorganisms ate through their suits.

There was the tiniest blemish in the perfect sliver, a slot just the right size for a small black tablet.

It would be proven time and again over the next years that John Shepard had impulse control issues, and this was not the first, nor the last time, he would do something potentially dangerous just to see what would happen.

"Commander, wai.." Alenko's voice was lost in the burst of white light and white noise that overtook Shepard's brain as he inserted the trinket.

+++

His head hurt so much.

With a grunt he picked himself up off the ground and spat out the blood trickling down the back of his throat.  It wasn't just a headache, though.  He'd had those before, and Ghost had brewed up the bark of the sighing tree . The drink tasted terrible, but it made the pain stop.

This was different, though, and without thinking, he brought his hand to the back of his head, wincing. A lump, at the base of his skull. Big as a nut, and tender as a bruise.  "Ow." He took his hand away, half-expecting to find blood. Gingerly, he hauled himself to his feet using his spear as a lever. The finely-chipped flint tip had a nasty chunk taken out of it and he cursed, not knowing if it was going to be salvageable.

The glint in the corner of his eye drew his gaze upwards and that's when he saw it. The moon bird.

It was pale and bright, even with the day sky behind it, hovering silently, watching without eyes,  flyinf without wings and he felt ill, suddenly remembering when the thing had swooped down on him before. His spear had glanced off it's shining hide with a loud sound, and it had snatched him up and swallowed him into darkness. It had not been the first time, but it always jumbled his thoughts when it happened.

Strange visions scrabbling in the back of his head. Too many eyes looking down at him.  Watching him. Watching *through* him.

"Asshole." He growled, shaking a fist at the creature. "I hate you."

His head hurt, and he'd been shit out by a moon bird again. Ghost was going to laugh at him.

~~

To his credit, Ghost mostly kept a straight face as he looked over the lump. "I can put something on that for the pain." He said, pushing aside Hunter's messy brown hair, the feathers and beads woven into the strands.

Ghost lived apart, Remembering. He painted the stories and told them when the moons were right. The way his mother had. And her mother. But there had been no daughters, only a son born under a dark moon.

He wasn't allowed to hunt or gather, and depended on the clan for support, in return for his stories and medicines. Wasn't allowed by their fires, only they to his.

It  was only because he lived apart that Hunter was allowed at his fire. When the bird had first taken the man, he'd been gone for almost an entire cycle of the moon.  His name was buried in the earth and his mate had driven him from the fire when he'd returned, babbling about the shining bird that had eaten him and then shat him out.

Ghost had protected him then.  Even though when he had taken Hunter in, the offerings had slowed, the visits for reading dreams or finding healing nearly stopped.

So  Hunter repaid the debt with ever reindeer he took and every fish he caught and every basket of berries he could find.

It would never be enough, the price of being allowed at Ghost's fire, under his furs. He could never repay that. Could never repay the tenderness that had grown between them.

"I appreciate you're not laughing." Hunter sighed, wincing as Ghost applied the leaves to the aching knot. "If it's supposed to be giving me a message from the other world, it's doing  a crap job of it."

"There are tricksters in the other world. Who play jokes and games on the unwary." Ghost sat down beside him. "Maybe you've attracted this one."

"Well, at least it was only for a day this time." Hunter sighed, turning his attention to the damaged flint. "I wish I could drive it away for good. Every time something like this happens, it gives the Elder more reason to want to send me away permanently. "

"..I won't let that happen, Hunter. Have some faith in me." Ghost squeezed his arm. "Now, did it at least leave you your kill?"

"Squirrels. It drives the game away when it comes, no matter how much I ask the Mother to guide the deer."  He squeezed the little ivory idol in his pouch. It did little to make sense of the confusing creature that had taken an unwelcome shine to him, but it was soothing in its own way. "But it'll be enough for tonight."

"I .. saw your children down at the water's edge today." Ghost said as he added a little brush to the fire. "They look like you, even if they will not know your name."

"I just want them to be safe. I want everyone to be safe, and this damn bird…"

"Then I will tell you a story tonight, and drive away the fear." Ghost said calmly, and Hunter ducked down into his fur cloak.  Any excuse to hear the other's voice as he sang the stories of their ancestors.

 

~~

The seasons slowly changed, the pleasant cool of summer fading as the leaves turned and the ice crept down.  Ghost hated to move, to leave the stories behind, sleeping in their cave, but in the depths of winter, none of the people could survive. So, as every year, he packed up the idols of ivory and bone, and his tools and his paints.

With a hollow reed, he blew paint around his hand to leave the imprint there, then dragged Hunter over to do the same. "So we leave a piece of ourselves behind to protect them until we return." Ghost said,  twining their stained fingers before hoisting his sack.

They followed behind the rest of the clan, skirting the edge of the water. But no matter how many days south they went, the game went further and faster. The squirrels and rabbits were no substitute for a good deer, but the tracks were colder than the winter racing behind them.

When they made temporary camp, Hunter gathered up his weapons with concern. "I hate having to leave you for a few days.  Maybe the Elder will.."

"Please.  I have enough here for  those days. I can't go to them, you know that. Any more than you can." Ghost shook his head, dark eyes gentle. "Go on. I'll wait here as long as it takes."

That night, the moon bird swept from the twilight sky, one eye red as fire as it chased Hunter through the woods.  And Hunter screamed. Not for himself, but for the brace of rabbits that went tumbling down the snowy hillside as it snatched him away.  The fire burning from the creature's eye squeezed the air from his lungs, even as his spear bounced uselessly against its shining skin.

"GHOST!!"

 He was going to fight like hell to hold him again. To hear his voice again. This time, he would find a way to kill the…

+++

Shepard scrabbled upright, panicking. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't see, and then..

Alenko was gently holding him up, and the turian crouched before them, helmet tilted quizzically.

"Shepard.. are you ok?" Kaidan's voice rasped softly in his ear, dark eyes gentle behind the lenses of his helmet.

Shepard looked around, and for the briefest of moments let his hand rest over Alenko's. He gave it a little squeeze then shook him off. "I'm.. I'm fine. Forget about it."

(Just let me hear your voice.)

 

 

 


End file.
